Syd Stelvio – Gaucho Trail Day 9: Corrientes to Santiago del Estero– 644km
There comes a time on any adventure rally, when you have to buckle up and settle into covering some serious mileage. Each event has days when you just have to get across a distance, to either make overnights work or to tie the route together, and as we approached the finish of the first third of this event, today was the day to get some distance done.
644km’s were planned for day 9, a fair distance by anyone’s standards, especially as the route would take us into the monotony of the Gran Chaco and it’s long, straight roads. We left the bustling and bohemian streets of Corrientes early, crossing the impressive Puente General Manuel Belgrano bridge, that spans the Parana River. The tarmac on the highway beyond was less than impressive and wouldn’t be the first time today that we would find ourselves dodging the craters on a fast-moving road section.
On days like these, you have to settle into the groove, and with vast differences between navigational instructions, it is an opportunity to relax a bit and observe the scenery and landscape we are passing through. It also provides some time for reflection, and perhaps some comfortable silence between driver and navigator as each contemplates everything we have seen since leaving Montevideo.
Remarkably it felt like we had barely done any distance by the time the first passage control came around, 140km out from the MTC, at a busy fuel station where locals stared at the cars as they filled up endless lines of scooters, and a pair of traditionally dressed ladies handed out freebie baked snacks that looked nice, but largely tasted of soggy disappointment.
The next 155km to the middle of the daytime control also went by in the blink of an eye, this time on quieter roads, between dense fields of sunflowers that stretched for miles, an appropriate backdrop on a day when the temperature peaked at 35 degrees. It was at the midpoint of the day where there would be a forced delay to proceedings. There had been a last-minute addition to this transit day, with a kart circuit test materialising at the last minute, giving everyone an opportunity to break the tedium with a short blast around track. At the 11th hour though, the owner of the circuit got cold feet and began putting conditions on the circuits use, such as the cars couldn’t travel faster than 40kph. Not really practical for a test.
At the last moment then, an alternative was found, a dirt track shaped like the Brands Hatch Indy circuit, though running in reverse. The surface was dry, dusty and quick, and, most importantly, immensely fun to run a car around. There was only to be one circulation, and some of the straights were disrupted by cones, but everybody went at their one lap like it was their last, leading to some spectacular smiles for the drivers, and some wonderful photos for the photographers – albeit at the cost of a bit of pulmonary disease, after breathing in several billion milligrams of dust.
It was no real surprise that Lars Rolner rotated around the circuit the quickest, in his 911 that is made for the job, though Patrick Watts put in a very accomplished drive to put his Sunbeam Tiger second fastest, with Fritz Muller rounding out the top three, and definitely taking the prize for the greatest dust displacement in his Escort. Perhaps more importantly, after day 8’s test debacle, there were no wrong tests, and everybody completed the circuit without any extra penalty added to their times.
As everyone left the track full of adrenalin, it was perhaps a bit of a come down when they realized just what a long run it was going to be to the night’s hotel, with over 300 km still to cover. The afternoons road took us into the Campo del Cielo, famous for its asteroid strike and extensive meteorite impact field. Wikipedia will tell you the space rock entered the earth’s atmosphere and fragmented some 5000 years ago, but from the state of the road surface, as far as I can tell it actually landed a week last Tuesday, as the tarmac in places was more crater than road. That’s no exaggeration, and a ponderous approach was required, as well as some last-minute evasive action, that sometimes required a choice between a pothole and an oncoming truck – I believe in that scenario the pothole is always the better part of valor.
It felt like the poor surface was never going to end but thank fully once clear everything sped up again and soon the afternoons passage control loomed, at another petrol station that was full of curious locals eager to get close to the cars and their occupants. It seems everywhere we go in Argentina, we get a fabulous reception, and interactions like this are a real shot of adrenalin on a long day.
Despite there being plenty of fuel, and a huge and empty Shell petrol station a hundred meters further down from the passage control, not everybody took the opportunity to fill their tanks. Now, the seasoned rallyists amongst us will tell you it is always a good idea to stick some petrol in, experienced hands like Bill Cleyndert for example. So, the last person you would expect to find on the side of the road, cap in hand, begging for some fuel would be Bill. But that is exactly what happened not too much further down the road after the scheduled stop. The Bentley had run dry and come to an abrupt stop. The fuel has vapourisedmore quickly in the heat, pleaded Bill. Well, yes, and vapourised due to the accelerator pedal of the Bentley being pushed to the floor almost all of the time.
Everyone stopped to help, or perhaps to gloat, but the Good Samaritans of the piece were Koen van den Broeck and Bruno Grimbers, who provided a can of fuel and got the crew of car two underway again. That perhaps should have been it for the day’s drama, but the run into Santiago del Estero took the cars down a lengthy dirt track, that crossed a few small waterways on concrete bridges, one of which Nigel Woof managed to collect in his Datsun, near ripping the front right wheel off in the process. Luckily, the Sweeps were able to fix the 240Z and get the Woofs into the evenings halt, before they went OTL.
Considering it was meant to be a transit day, day nine has been quite the eventful run, even if it has travelled through the largely featureless Chaco. Day 10 begins early, as we head towards Salta, and the second planned rest day of the rally. Nos vemos mañana.
Syd.
